Sunday, November 10, 2013

The finished cover for T.M.'s newest book. A lot of work went into this
one, mostly looking for a model. Thankfully, Michaela gave up permission
to use one of her wonderful stock images. The wall is from the
Ford-Green Cemetery in Mineola, TX, & the burial mound and other two
tombstones are from New Hope Cemetery in Mineola. There are a lot of
mounds out there. It's really neat. Also, T.M. recently got a post print of this framed and hung it up in her dining room. It looks awesome.

The Last 40 Days
is about a man who travels back in time & ends up witnessing the
Crucifixion. I initially did a bit of research to find out what the
landscape looked like back then, and found that it was a lot different
that it is today. Technically there should be an abundance of trees,
shrubs & plants in the background but I was limited on what stock to
use & C L really wanted sand dunes. He really likes the way it come
out, so I'm glad. The whole time I was working on this, all I could
think about was Life of Brian. I even played 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' for some inspiration.

The
hardest past was deciding on using either a physical time machine or or
use a portal. C L wanted the Stargate...which, as you can guess, isn't
going to happen. It would have looked really cool, but I have no desire
to see the inside of a jail cell. I looked around for weeks trying to
find something use use as a base but came up empty handed. So, I started
looking for portals. Typing in 'portal' in dA gave me a wide range of
results, from Portal game/logo pics to several misplaced photos of
penises (don't ask). Eventually, I stumbled across the one I used. I
added in the lines to give it a little more action & depth.

Update 1 - C L decided he wanted the dash out of MP1. I also added in a shadow for the man, which I realized I had forgotten.

This was a fun cover to do since I finally got to put Trana on the cover
of one of her books. This book is basically all of her blog post for
last year, and she will do a new one each year will all the collected
posts. The general theme for the covers will be candid shots of her
doing stuff around the house while the ghosts do whatever in the
background.

For this one, we used her office. After taking the
screen off & opening the window directly behind her desk, I stood up
on a step-stool and took pictures of her looking from side to side. I
would have liked to shoot a bit higher but couldn't due to the window.
Plus, a few of the pictures came out a little blurred. I still have
trouble putting a lot of weight on my knee from time to time, and I was
extra nervous standing up on something (last think I need is to fall and
mess my knee up again). The overall image ended up being a merge of
three, and I had to draw in part of the wall, ceiling, computer monitor
& door.

This one took me a few tries to get it going. Originally, I was going to
use a photo of the actual house talked about in the 'Hell House'
chapter. The photo was taken years before digital cameras came out and
got really messed up every time I tried to adjust the brightness. So
after some searching, I found a house that looked very similar and when
from there. The shadow person is the same that is used for the team logo, but just in white. I used a few layers of fog brushes for the mist
set at 40% to 50% opacity, then erased them down from that at about 42%
opacity. That way it lost most of the detail to look like a very light
mist. I also painted in the treeline in the background.

A slight redesign of T.M. Simmons' Ghost Hunting Diary Volume II cover.
Trana did the original version herself and decided that it needed to be
updated along with the rest. The original is still up on Amazon if you
want to see it.

I took the original image and centered it, then
added a brighter sky & clouds after adjusting the
colors/brightness/contrast. I also used a different font as well.

The original cover was just the background image. I added in the couple
and didn't have to do a whole lot editing to them. I added facial
& body hair to the guy, but you can't see most of it. I also added
in some wrinkles to make him a bit older, as well as some grey hairs on
his sideburns.

Well, the first version I did proved to be a little too hot. So I did a toned down version.

I
didn't have to do too much with the guy except some body and facial
hair. I also removed a tribal armband tattoo on his arm. The only
thing I really changed on the woman was the hair. I wanted to cover up
her mid-drift but nothing really worked.

CL told me it need to have a planet with two moons, & everything else was up to me. I love it when I can go crazy on covers. I used the same nebula & font from the first cover to keep up with the sort-of theme. The hardest part overall was finding the flares. I saw several good packs with PNG files but were way too expensive. The pack I went with were on a black background, so I edied out as much as I could and screened them. After adjusting the brightness/contrast a bit, everything blended right in.

There are a total of three flares layered at various opacities (is that even a word?). I was going for a light effect where you would be seeing the light washing over the view-port/screen upon entering the atmosphere or on approaching the planet. It also (unintentionally) gave it a bit of a 3D effect.
The moons are also the same moon, just reversed with altered color and added shadows.

Saturday, May 12, 2012

This is the new cover for Montana Surrender, a romance novel by Tran mae Simmons. Like the original Bittersweet Promises cover, this one was only the background image to start. Trana wanted something attention grabbing and spicy, and I think I pulled it off.

The guy, or really body in this case, didn't need much done. I added on some hair on both the chest and arm. The woman, on the other had, had a lot of work done. First, I had to move the corsett up a bit and then paint out the black & white tube top. Then I darkend her hair, then added in fallway locks on both sides. Next, I added in the eyelashes then adjusted her overall skin tone. The last bit I did was to extend the grass down in the background a bit so that the tree sat a little higher.

On a funnier note, I've noticed that this one seems to be a little too hot for many of the groups on dA. It's been accepted then removed from three so far.

This is the revamp of the Bittersweet Promises cover. The original version of the cover only had the background image and title/author text, and was done quick since she had to get the book up with a limited amount of time.

For the most part, there wasn't a lot to be done with this one except some clean up. I added in facial and body hair on the man and evened out the woman's skin tone. The hardest part was making the sweat. I'm not overly satisfied with it, but I'm hoping to go back at a later date and fix it.

The finished cover for the upcoming science fiction release of The Wormhole Project by CL Smothers. This one was fun, mostly since CL had a very clear idea of what he wanted. The hardest part was finding good star brushes. The apple was my own creation, and I was super happy that I got a chance to create my own stock for a change.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Cover for Trana's upcoming Mystery/Thriller release, Winter Prey. I have been waiting ages to do this cover, and I'm glad that she is getting the book out. I helped edit several of the chapters, along with our Writer's Group, and can't wait to read the finished book.

The most difficult thing on this one was finding the eyes to use for the creature. After a lot of looking here in dA, I went over to Dreamstime since Trana still had some credits left. I was originally going to have the eyes just under the title, but they didn't show up well on the mountain background. The reflection effect on the lake is much better and gives it a good bit of creepiness.

I've already gotten a lot of greats comments on it, so I'm very excited that it has gone over well so far.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Another book cover commission for Trana! This one is for the third volume of her ghost hunt diaries. All of these stories are true, and I'm in a few of them. Like her other books, this one will be available to download on Kindle.

Anyway, she just needed something simple for this one. I originally had gone out and taken pictures of the tree that is featured in one of the hunts, but I couldn't get the image to darken enough without distorting it. The stock image used is actually fairly similar, so it worked out in the end.

Saturday, May 7, 2011

My good friend Trana commissioned me to make some new book covers for her Dead Man series, which she is getting ready to re-release on Amazon as Kindle books.

The most difficult part of making the covers was finding stock images on deviantArt that would allow commercial use. I tried looking through a few of the stock websites, but the prices they ask for stock is ridicules. iStockPhoto wanted almost $200 for one.

The stories themselves are a mix of supernatural mystery and humor. I tried to get that across with the covers. The first one, Dead Man Talking, came out okay, but I really love how the Dead Man Haunt cover came out. I was lucky to find the skunk image.